Upcoming Heroes of the Storm Balance Patch Notes - Week Of September 18th, 2017

[Nerraw]

We'll be releasing a new patch for Heroes of the Storm later this week in order to apply balance changes along with a few bug fixes.


Heroes

Assassin

Cassia

Stats

• Basic Attack damage increased from 125 to 130

Abilities

• Blinding Light (W)
  
  • Passive damage bonus to blinded targets increased from 15 to 20%

Talents

• Level 1
  
  • Thunderstroke (Q)
    
    • First quest reward damage bonus increased from 75 to 100
  • True Sight (W)
    
    • Removed
  • Seraph’s Hymn (W)
    
    • Moved from Level 13
    • Cooldown reduction per basic attack against Blinded Heroes reduced from 3 to 2 seconds
  
  

Chromie

Abilities

• Sand Blast (Q)
  
  • Reduced the number of Sand Blast hits required to unlock the Sand Blast echo from 80 to 60

Talents

• Level 2
  
  • Timely Surprise (E)
    
    • Now also increases the cast range of Time Trap by 33%
  
  

Developer Comment: Only about 40% of Chromie players were unlocking the echo over the course of a game, and among players that did it was occurring later than we’d like. By reducing the requirements for completing Chromie’s quest, we won’t increase her late game power at all, but make her output a little more consistent.


Kel'Thuzad

Abilities

• Frost Nova (W)
  
  • Mana cost increased from 45 to 50
• Chains of Kel’Thuzad (E)
  
  • Mana cost increased from 45 to 50
• Frost Blast (R)
  
  • Cooldown reduced from 100 to 80 seconds
• Shadow Fissure (R)
  
  • Damage reduced from 440 to 400
  • Cooldown increased from 15 to 20 seconds
  • Mana cost increased from 50 to 60

Talents

• Level 4
  
  • Phylactery of Kel’Thuzad (Active)
    
    • Quest requirement increased from 10 to 12 Regen Globes
  
  
• Level 7
  
  • Accelerated Decay (Q)
    
    • Bonus damage increased from 20 to 25%
  • Glacial Spike (Active)
    
    • Damage reduced from 220 to 60
    • Delay before the spike spawns increased from .5 to 1 seconds
  
  
• Level 13
  
  • Chains of Ice (E)
    
    • Slow duration reduced from 1.25 to 1 second
    • Slow amount decreased from 70 to 60%
  
  
• Level 16
  
  • Hungering Cold (W)
    
    • Bonus damage reduced from 60 to 55
  
  

Developer Comment: As expected, there is a fairly large discrepancy between Kel’Thuzad’s performance across the entire game vs. players who are getting experienced with him at a higher level. His win-rate has climbed more than most of our other releases as players get used to his kit, so most of our changes are aimed at talent balance and toning his power down. While we like the sharpness of his power spike due to Master of the Cold Dark, we’ll continue to keep an eye on his burst potential and his overall strength going forward.


The Butcher

Stats

• Basic Attack damage increased from 125 to 130
• Health scaling per level increased from 4 to 4.5%
• Health Regeneration scaling per level increased from 4 to 4.5%

Developer Comment: While we’ll be continuing to keep an eye on it, we believe that the Butcher’s quest tuning is appropriate. He has seen a significant drop in win rate in Hero League since our last round of changes, so we felt it was appropriate to increase his late-game Health so that he can keep up with other heroes, who often get many tools to survive his initial damage in teamfights.


Thrall

Stats

• Base Maximum Health increased from 1787 to 1876
• Base Health Regeneration increased from 3.7 to 3.9

Developer Comment: FOR THE HORDE!


Support

Brightwing

Abilities

• Soothing Mist (Trait)
  
  • Healing aura range increased from 6 to 7
• Blink Heal (R)
  
  • Cooldown reduced from 10 to 9 seconds

Talents

• Level 1
  
  • Dream Shot (Q)
    
    • New functionality:
      
      • Increases the range of Arcane Flare by 50%
      • Hitting an enemy Hero in the center portion of Arcane Flare reduces the cooldown of Arcane Flare to 1 second
    
    
  • Hyper Shift (Z)
    
    • Cooldown reduction per Hero healed increased from 2 to 3 seconds
  • Unfurling Spray (Trait)
    
    • Removed
  
  
• Level 4
  
  • Arcane Barrage (Q)
    
    • Removed
  • Peekaboo (Z)
    
    • Revealed area radius reduced from 20 to 15
    • Added functionality:
      
      • Pixie Dust is now applied to the target of Phase Shift
    
    
• Level 7
  
  • Phase Shield (Z)
    
    • Added functionality:
      
      • Now applies Shield to Brightwing and her target

Developer Comment: While Brightwing has been seeing a bit more play recently, her talent tree had some low-hanging fruit that we wanted to trim. Granting her a slightly larger range of Soothing Mist baseline will free up a more impactful choice at level 1. The addition of Arcane Barrage’s functionality into Dream Shot should also make that talent a bit more exciting to pick up. Overall, we were looking at giving the Faerie Dragon a few minor buffs and adjusting some talents in order to increase parity amongst her talent tiers.


Lt. Morales

Stats

• Base Maximum Health increased from 1528 to 1605
• Base Life Regen increased from 3.18 to 3.34

Abilities

• Healing Beam (Q)
  
  • Energy Regeneration cooldown reduced from 3 to 2 seconds
  • You can no longer redirect Healing Beam to a target that is already being healed by your Healing Beam

Talents

• Level 1
  
  • Caduceus Feedback (Passive)
    
    • Now increases Basic Attack Range by 1.1 and only generates Energy from Basic Attacks against Heroic targets.

Stukov

Talents

• Level 1
  
  • Spine Launcher (Passive)
    
    • Basic Attack damage reduction decreased from 50 to 30%

Tyrande

Talents

• Level 7
  
  • Huntress’ Fury (D)
    
    • Added functionality:
      
      • Now also increases the range of Hunter’s Mark by 50%
• Level 13
  
  • Empower (W)
    
    • Base cooldown reduction decreased from 4 to 2 seconds
  
  

Warriors

Chen

Talents

• Level 1
  
  • Grounding Brew (D)
    
    • Removed
  
  
• Level 7
  
  • Purifying Brew (D)
    
    • Cooldown reduced from 45 to 15 seconds
    • Added functionality:
      
      • Chen now gains 30 Spell Armor while channeling Fortifying Brew

Developer Comment: We realize how difficult it is for most Chen players to pass up Brewmaster’s Balance on Tier 3. We moved a powerful level 20 down to compete with it a couple patches ago but the data is still showing it as an underperformer. Lowering the cooldown drastically and granting it the functionality of Grounding Brew should incentivize players into choosing it when playing against certain team compositions.


Dehaka

Stats

• Basic Attack damage reduced from 105 to 100

Abilities

• Dark Swarm (W)
  
  • Damage per tick reduced from 50 to 47

Garrosh

Abilities

• Groundbreaker (Q)
  
  • Mana cost increased from 30 to 35
• Wrecking Ball (E)
  
  • Mana cost increased from 60 to 70
• Decimate (R)
  
  • Mana cost decreased from 30 to 25

Talents

• Level 1
  
  • Body Check (Active)
    
    • Cooldown decreased from 20 to 16 seconds
  
  
• Level 7
  
  • Into the Fray (Active)
    
    • Cooldown increased from 30 to 40 seconds

Developer Comment: These changes are a response to community feedback about Garrosh’s Mana costs. We initially kept them relatively low, as he is a fairly low impact Warrior when his combo is not available to him, however we agreed with the feedback and felt that he could use more Mana management.


Leoric

Abilities

• Entomb (R)
  
  • Cooldown reduced from 75 to 60 seconds

Bug Fixes
General

• Fixed a number of tooltip issues across the game.

Heroes, Abilities, and Talents

• Alarak: Casting Counter-Strike will now display a silver healthbar to indicate Protected status.
• Chromie: The Deep Breathing talent’s completed damage bonus will now match the tooltip located below her unit frame.
• Jaina: The Frost Armor talent will no longer cause Jaina’s damage to ignore armor.
• Leoric: Fixed an issue that could cause Leoric to become invisible after exiting Zagara’s Devouring Maw.
• Lt. Morales: Fixed an issue that caused Lt. Morale’s Displacement Grenade to reduce healing dealt after learning the System Shock talent.
• Uther: Fixed an issue causing Uther to gain extra damage and healing on consecutive casts of Wave of Light.
• Uther: Uther's Hammer of Justice will no longer apply a 30% slow after the Stun effect fades.

Sound

• Valla: Fixed an issue causing the Creed of the Hunter talent to not play quest sound effects when progress was earned.

User Interface

• Lt. Morales: The Cellular Reactor talent will now display an incoming heal indicator on the nameplate healthbar.

[Well]

Why nerf owl build, wtf.

Just WHY

[Ryme]

Brightwing buffs?! YESSSSS!

Why nerf owl build, wtf.

Just WHY

Community outcry, I suspect.

[Raugnaut]

Why nerf owl build, wtf.

Just WHY

Probably because of those few games where a Owl Tyrande 1v5s the entire enemy team by just launching owls at them while they take a boss.

[TheFirstOnes]

These "Balance Notes" weren't ever balanced to begin with, so at this rate, I don't even bother with ranting. |

Just can't wait for my Kil'jaeden/Archimonde Hero Team. Also can't wait for my Antorus/Mac'aree Aren....

Wait....what? S...so...they picked Alexstrasza? During LEGION'S BS?! ....

*Cries in not prepared*

[RH92]

Why nerf owl build, wtf.

Just WHY

Because this:
https://youtu.be/uMJDO32yivs?t=39m33s (Owl spam deciding a surprisingly close game between Fnatic and Zealots)

[Well]

Because this:
https://youtu.be/uMJDO32yivs?t=39m33s (Owl spam deciding a surprisingly close game between Fnatic and Zealots)

Uhm, so... 30mins of using Owl and hitting it, actually does something, that is not even grand and that's bad? What a fucking logic you got there, Blizzard.

[Deleted]

Owl build was completely rediculous. Played it 8 or 9 times, was always top hero damage - as a support/utility - but for one game, where I drafted her in a subpar comp and a Kael had 129k and I like 127. And it will remain OP in long games and if the Tyrande player knows what he's doing.

Overall after the Brightwing buffs, Rehgar nerfs, Monk nerfs, I dread a BW vs Lucio healing Meta, in lower leagues aka 'stand around and spread your good-ness'.

[RH92]

Uhm, so... 30mins of using Owl and hitting it, actually does something, that is not even grand and that's bad? What a fucking logic you got there, Blizzard.

Well, it felt stupid because it is rather easy to stack (especially at high levels of play) and it the safest poke.

The damage remains though, only frequency is nerfed. A good change.

[Well]

Well, it felt stupid because it is rather easy to stack (especially at high levels of play) and it the safest poke.

The damage remains though, only frequency is nerfed. A good change.

Honestly, I watched the video from the timestamp you sent, until the game played at the time was over, and honestly? Tyrande was using Owl for ~8 mins before it remotely did something.

If a PRO team can do nothing with Chromie and her displacement ultimate in 8 minutes (starting from minute 20) and let Tyrande (of all people) bombard them with Owls because they cannot dodge them, then that's their problem, honestly. Not to mention that healers can easily heal the damage from the owls.

And it's not just frequency that is being nerfed here. A 50% less uptime on Owl, means 50% less stacks from the moment you pick the talent, no matter how you look at this.

- - - Updated - - -

And please, don't let me read that it was so OP that teams picked their composition based on how to protect Tyrande, so she can bombard with Owls, because that's when a hero or spell/talent is problematic. Having a slow travelling, easy as hell to dodge skillshot versus you doing damage is only natural.

Honestly, I don't know why I am so pissed exactly. I guess it's that they hit spells and talents that are not really problematic (if at all, in this case), yet they allow absolutely ridiculous things exist in the game and degenerate it. And that includes strategies that are only possible because of certain heroes.

I cannot forget AAing Kael, and I still want the guy that forced a mage to actually AA, fired.

[RH92]

*Snip*

Tyrande wasn't overpowered, she was cheap. It isn't really difficult to spam a hard hitting ability.

She could stall objectives or flat out deny things even if she is the only survivor from her team. She could also stress out enemy Healers into wasting mana to give favourable engages for her team. All of this without any risk, from safety of her home.

Sure you can argue it is easy to dodge, but easier said than done if you have enemy team dancing in front of you while Tyrande stays way back shooting Owls at you.

[Well]

Tyrande wasn't overpowered, she was cheap. It isn't really difficult to spam a hard hitting ability.

She could stall objectives or flat out deny things even if she is the only survivor from her team. She could also stress out enemy Healers into wasting mana to give favourable engages for her team. All of this without any risk, from safety of her home.

Sure you can argue it is easy to dodge, but easier said than done if you have enemy team dancing in front of you while Tyrande stays way back shooting Owls at you.

That's exactly what she's designed to be. From the safety of her home, shoot owls, and upon finding a chance, engage with stealth to always have a favourable trade.

I won't get into this any longer. It is clear that HotS is no longer a game and that saddens me greatly.

[RH92]

That's exactly what she's designed to be. From the safety of her home, shoot owls, and upon finding a chance, engage with stealth to always have a favourable trade.

I won't get into this any longer. It is clear that HotS is no longer a game and that saddens me greatly.

I thought she was designed to be an utility Hero. Providing stun, scouting tool, heal and Mark, not an artillery mage.

I don't understand what you mean by your last sentence though.

[Nerraw]

The patch is currently being deployed to live servers. You may get a prompt to restart if you're ingame.

[apepi]

I had a game where I could one shot Abathur with my owls, most of the time I accidentally killed him when trying to hit someone else.

[Nerraw]

Note: If you play on a non-US region, you may be met with a game mismatch error upon trying to launch. Swapping your region to US on the launcher, updating the game from there, and then switching back to your own region, should fix the issue.

[Deleted]

Note: If you play on a non-US region, you may be met with a game mismatch error upon trying to launch. Swapping your region to US on the launcher, updating the game from there, and then switching back to your own region, should fix the issue.

Did that; now patcher gets stuck at ~98%. Trying repair now.

Was on my end; I had changed settings with my firewall.

[Nerraw]

Did that; now patcher gets stuck at ~98%. Trying repair now.

Very odd. Mine went through with no issues after I changed region.